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God Rains Shower Project,
at 327 Carrall Street, Vancouver, BC
Friday, January 13, 2012
From time to time, I've wondered about making a movie or a TV show about the Downtown East Side. (There was a time, earlier in my life -- about 35 years ago -- when I actually harbored thoughts of being an actor and writer: I got enough paying gigs to make me realize the idea was possible ... but not probable.) The show would be called "Rev. Downtown" (my legion of fan would recognize that as the title of this blog) and it would paint a picture of the DTES as I've seen it over the 8 years that I've been there -- gritty and unpredictable but with the undercurrent of Hope that runs through what we do at Gospel Mission and The Lord's Rain. As I've tried to express over the years, it's not all bad news -- not even close -- despite the image projected by activists and the media.
But what would the script look like? And who would play the characters? It would be a tour de force for an ensemble of character actors: improvising their parts without stereotyping or ridiculing anyone. Maybe Sean Penn (if he can take time out from making politically-correct "statement" movies), Matt Damon, Philip Seymour Hoffman and maybe Donald Sutherland and Graham Greene. And if you tried to write a script, a producer would send it back with orders to come up with something "real".
(Interestingly, that's one of the reasons why I believe the Bible is the Word of God and not (as Peter put it) some cunningly-devised fable: what human could devise it? The more I'd read it, the more I'd hear, "you can't make this stuff up". But I digress.)
Take, for example, the conversations I had at The Lord's Rain on Tuesday morning -- two conversations at the same time. I've joked on occasion that you don't have to be ADD to work at The Lord's Rain, but it helps. Often, someone will start talking to you regardless of whether you're already talking to someone else, so you usually have to tune one ear to the new conversation long enough to analyze whether it's something that can be put on hold until you've finished the current conversation or something vitally important that needs to be dealt with right away.
Compounding the situation this past Tuesday was the fact that the quarterly HST rebates were distributed the day before. (For those of you not in Canada, the government sends an amount each quarter to people on low incomes to compensate (at least in part) for their having to pay the Harmonized Sales Tax.) The rebates are a great idea in theory, but on the DTES, it means more money available to spend on drugs, and by gad, that's what they did on Monday. On Tuesday morning, many of the people were showing the effects and I was caught between two conversations with a newcomer named Vance and Dale, a man I've known since my start at Rainbow Mission in 2004.
Vance was notable for his scrupulous good manners, asking politely and thanking us for coffee, a drink of water, a refill ... but he had also been sitting by himself, deep in conversation with an unseen interlocutor, and occasionally gesturing very broadly -- almost violently. Dale had sat down next to him and he and I started talking about prayer. That's where Vance chimed in, excusing himself for stepping into the conversation.
But Vance's conversation was only semi-coherent, bouncing from one thought to the next like a flea on a hotplate. (My late mother, an actor, was once cast to play a pilot who'd suffered a brain injury in a plane crash. The sentences did not connect one word to the next, and for someone who used mnemonics -- mental images -- to memorize her lines, the challenge of learning this script was enormous. She literally had to memorize them word by word.) There was a common thread through his talking, however: demons and evil spirits. He talked about Jesus with bright shafts of light coming from His face, his own Aztec spiritual ancestry, standing toe-to-toe with the demon Pestilence -- and imitating Pestilence with a stance and facial contortions that made me feel like I was looking at Mr. P right there. Vance also talked about Leviathan (another demon), the Holy Spirit, bright lights and colors and a lot of other things I can't remember.
I sat there -- not frightened -- but fascinated. Interestingly, his talk about the spirit world did not go into things like the New World Order or other worldwide conspiracy theories (others talk about those). It was all about demons and spirits. Had he been part of a cult? Does he walk around constantly thinking these things, or do those thoughts come only when he's on drugs? (And I daresay, it's at moments like that, that I'm praying someone is on drugs! I'm only half-joking.)
All through this, Dale was continuing his conversation. Dale's mind was fried long ago by the lethal combination of mental illness and crack cocaine. He primarily follows a single theme: "I'm alright, aren't I?" He talks very loud and sometimes very fast -- the volume and the speed generally depend on whether he's affected by the street drugs or his own "head" medication has taken effect. At Rainbow Mission, he took great joy in wiping down the pews after the service. "Will you anoint my head with oil," he once asked me, "so I can wipe down the pews and not bring any evil to them?"
I thought I saw signs he was actually improving, but after Rainbow closed at the end of 2006, I didn't see much of him and when he did turn up at Gospel Mission he was in worse shape ... and the descent hasn't really let up. "I'm alright, aren't I? I'm gonna be OK, right? They say they're trying to help me but they don't, you know, they don't ..." (I'm not sure who "they" are: social workers, perhaps, or public health nurses? They probably do their best, but with limited resources, they can only do so much. Try telling that to the patients, though.)
"... I pray, you know," he went on, "... I hold my Bible every night ..."
"Do you read it?" I asked. "Just holding it won't do you any good."
"I should read it more, shouldn't I? I read the Psalms. I should read the Bible more, you're right."
"The Psalms are a good start," I replied. "Build on that."
"Yeah, I can build on that. I read the Psalms years ago. I should read it more, shouldn't I?"
Dale desperately needs validation of his life. Even trying to elicit some kind of criticism for not reading his Bible more reminds him that he's still alive and can still draw closer to God. That is, in fact, a common factor among so many of those on the DTES. That's a big reason why they come into The Lord's Rain: it's become a source of Hope -- that intangible reason for carrying on -- that is in such short supply in the area. And you know what? While it's good that we have staff and supporters who approach people with love and openness, the people themselves have made it what it is.
I think it's because of that, that some situations get resolved when they might have turned ugly. A couple of weeks ago, Danilo and one of the 'regulars' (Joe is his name) got into an argument over something to do with the coffee. The argument escalated to a veiled threat to "take it outside". Joe left ... Danilo was upset that he'd nearly lost control ... John was upset that someone gave Danilo "attitude" over the coffee ... A week later, Joe came in and apologized to Danilo. Danilo apologized for his role in it. End of discussion.
Incidents like that are a good indicator of the success of The Lord's Rain: that people are able to make up after a near dust-up. It's encouraging, and you know something? People need validation -- and sometimes, so do we.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Those of you who have been following this saga from the beginning probably know that one of the challenges has been to find a niche for Ladies' Day. It was actually put on Brodie Collins' heart -- he who did the plumbing for the project -- just as we were opening: that many women might not be comfortable showering or hanging out with a bunch of men nearby. So we decided to set aside such a time.
But what time? We began with Friday nights; that had limited success, partly because not many people want to shower-up at 7:00 in the evening and partly because another Lord's Rain opening started up earlier in the afternoon. So we kept trying new times, and it's always been difficult getting people to volunteer for an early-morning opening. Ladies' Day, therefore, became something of a moving target as we tried to find the right formula.
Then, this past spring, with Ladies' Day sitting in the Tuesday 9-Noon slot, our friend Randall pointed out that one reason why it was no more successful there was because people were lining up for lunches at some of the other agencies around the Downtown East Side -- and when it came to the choice between a shower and lunch, you can understand which won out. At that point, Janet declared that she was willing to give an early morning a shot and so, we moved Ladies' Day yet again to 7-10am on Mondays.
Monday, we got some evidence that we've hit the "sweet spot". With Janet away on vacation, I went down to open up. Sandy, whom I've known since the Rainbow Mission days in 2004-2006, came to help out, as did Megan, a new volunteer, who lives at the Rainier Hotel, a few doors away on Carrall Street. It's a single-room-occupancy (SRO) hotel, which caters primarily to women. Diane Brown, who works on Wednesday mornings, had met Megan a couple of weeks ago and invited her to come in: Megan asked if she could volunteer.
Megan seems like someone with a wellspring of gifts and ideas, who has -- for one reason or another -- never had a chance to give them an outlet. Drugs, mental illness, abusive past, you name it: anything can keep a lid on someone's self-esteem and make them keep their gifts to themselves and all have played a role in Megan's life. We'll get to know her more in the days to come. But one thing is certain: she's enthusiastic about bringing something to the Mission.
One of those is in "talking up" The Lord's Rain. She's been making little flyers to hand out at some of the social service agencies and telling the women in The Rainier about The Lord's Rain and Ladies' Day in particular. Already, it's starting to bear fruit.
This morning, a woman I hadn't seen before came in, using a walker. Ethel is native, 63, and in a lot of pain from the effects of arthritis and diabetes. She's also trying to kick a drug habit. "One of the women at the Rainier sent me over," she said. That would be Megan. Ethel was going for an interview to get into Ellendale, a recovery program in Surrey -- the kind where you allow yourself to be locked away for six months. But she was hungry, needed coffee, and needed to rest her feet.
One of the "meaning to get" things on my list has been a proper footbath, but I managed to rustle up a plastic bin and some foaming bath gel and ran warm water into it. Ethel plunged her gnarled, callused feet into the suds and the relief that came over her face was indescribable.
(The Health Contact Centre, which closed last year when a private not-for-profit agency took over some of its services, was noted for its footbaths, and people on the DTES haven't been able to find such a thing since; at the time, it was noted that the word "contact" was very important in the title: a vital face-to-face connection that you don't get in mainstream health clinics.)
"This is truly a house of the Lord!" she exclaimed. "I can feel His presence here!" Sandy and I prayed over Ethel for her to have favor in the interview and healing for all things, known and unknown.
Then Megan came in, followed by another woman. Kathy is her name, and she had been divorced from her first husband, then widowed by her second, who was a Pentecostal pastor. Now here she was on the Downtown East Side. There's a story there, and eventually, I imagine we'll hear about it.
"Let's pray for Ethel that she gets in at Ellendale!" Megan said.
"We already did pray for her," I said, and immediately heard the Lord say, "Fool! Don't stop her from praying!"
By some miracle, I managed to recover and encourage her to pray before any discouragement set in, and Megan prayed a lovely, heartfelt prayer for Ethel.
"Let's sing," Ethel said. "'This is the day (this is the day)/That the Lord has made (that the Lord has made)/Let us rejoice (let us rejoice)/And be glad in it ....' "
And then they launched into "Put Your Hand in the Hand of the Man from Galilee".
And so we drank coffee and ate Cobs Bread buns and talked of everything and nothing and by the time closing time came around, none of us wanted to leave. But the office was calling and Ethel did have to get up to the health clinic. We'll probably hear soon how things went. And there's a definite sense that Ladies' Day took a big step closer to the way it was envisaged from the start.
December 19, 2009
Showers of blessing – the Lord’s Rain
One of the obvious things about people on the Downtown East
Side is that they’re generally filthy. Living on the
street or in shelters, that’s hard to avoid. But it’s
also obvious that they’d rather be clean. We saw people
come into Gospel Mission and wash up at the laundry tub at
the back, drying their hair with dishtowels, and wanted to
do something about it; in late 2007, God provided the motive,
opportunity and means.
One of the ground-floor spaces in our building came vacant,
and even though we had zero dollars to make it happen, our
landlord gave us the opportunity to draw up a plan for a showers
facility.
From the beginning, God made it clear that the project was
His will. Two days before our deadline, pledges came in totalling
$4,000. The Oasis Church in Duncan, which has supported Gospel
Mission for many years, put together a work party to build
the stalls and sub-floor; a plumber who was “saved off
the streets” at Gospel Mission donated his labour (and
much of the material); Andrew Sheret, Ltd., donated four shower
enclosures and the fittings; financial contributions, large
and small, started coming in as others caught the vision.
The media played an important role at key times, telling the
public what was going on. On one occasion, a door was left
unlocked through an oversight and some tools were stolen;
when a TV report was aired, an anonymous donor stepped forward
with a large cash donation to replace the tools and keep the
project on track.
The Lord’s Rain, so dubbed by Judy Babcook, wife of
senior pastor Barry Babcook, opened on April 30, 2008. Since
then, it has provided more than 700 showers, thousands of
cups of coffee and, in a glorious twist on The Law Of Unintended
Consequences, a community place where people can escape from
the streets, find good conversation, ranging from the Canucks
to current events to others on the street to the Bible. We
don’t outwardly evangelize, but the people who come in
know who we are. That understanding, plus the fact that The
Lord’s Rain exists to provide one of the basic needs
of human life – cleanliness – brings the Light of
Christ to that dark area and puts the Gospel into action.
“Jesus with the skin on,” is the way senior pastor
Barry Babcook describes it.
Further, the fact that The Lord’s Rain came about not
through government programs or a single large corporation
but by a group of private individuals and businesses with
their unique gifts infuses the place with the intangible sense
that people do care.
Saturday, November 8, 2008
The Showers Saga - 31: One Year On ...
I just looked at the calendar and noticed that yesterday --
besides being the first Friday of the week -- marked one year
since Barry approached Greg Bromley, the son of Jim Bromley,
who's been our landlord for almost 60 years, and told him
about the idea to install showers in the vacant ground-floor
space at 327 Carrall Street. At that time, we had Zero dollars
to put towards it, but we asked for two weeks in which to
come up with a plan and the funding for it. Barry and I had
agreed that if the money was there, we'd push forward.
Greg told us he had two expressions of interest in the site
already, but he was willing to forego those to give us a chance.
The first "worldly" sign that this was God's intention.
I say "worldly" sign, because there had been plenty
of signs in the Spirit leading up to that, including the fact
that Barry and I had had the idea put on our hearts independently
of each other, and that there were two prophecies spoken,
which related to expansion of the Mission's "footprint"
and new ways of reaching people. Greg's willingness to give
us a shot was the first confirmation.
And so here we are: it's been six months since we opened,
and through the end of October, we had logged 311 showers,
I don't know how many cans of coffee (not to mention the sugar:
we got a call from some Manitoba farmers recently, saying
they were running out of beets!), and many new people who've
come in to chat and take a "break" from being "street
people"; many of them have started coming to the services
upstairs. Truly, the love of Christ in action, and we give
God all the glory: it's His will for the area, because it's
not His will that any of His little ones perish.
Consider, too, the uphill battle to get people to focus on
Jesus when their brains are tuned to focusing on their next
hit of drugs: society isn't helping, either, with the constant
barrage of propaganda for InSite and its ilk. It's like opposite
poles: at the one is the message that society has given up
on people who are on drugs, and at the other is the message
that God does NOT give up on His people!
One intriguing development of late is that The Lord's Rain
is about to get an artistic component: some young artists
-- one of them from Emily Carr University, and part of the
Campus Ministry there -- have stepped up to paint murals on
the inside walls. I'll send more details -- and pictures --
later, but this was a connection made by our beloved friend,
Kathy Kinahan, through a group she's associated with, "Big
Give Vancouver".
Today's opening was busy. We're into monsoon season in Vancouver,
so lots of people came in for coffee, a chance to warm up
and -- in six cases -- a shower.
Actually, make that five showers. One fellow came in who
was so drunk he could hardly stand. He asked for two cups
of coffee and had the shakes so badly I had to carry them
for him while he went to sit down. Then he decided he wanted
a shower, but was unable to get undressed, so I helped him
with that and got the shower going and left him sitting on
the chair in the stall. But when I checked on him about five
minutes later, he was still sitting there in his underwear,
complaining of a terrible pain in his stomach. Not being a
doctor -- and not wanting to just write it off as "you've
just had too much to drink", in case it was something
really serious -- I called the ambulance.
They arrived quickly, and at first, he said he wanted to
go to detox. The paramedics said they wouldn't take him there,
but they'd take him to hospital to have him checked out. Finally,
he agreed to that, and they bundled him up on the gurney and
took him away.
I have to admit, I don't understand the detox system. I hear
of some people waiting several days to get a space there,
some who spend a couple of weeks in the place ... and now
this paramedic tells me, many will go to detox and spend maybe
half an hour in there, waiting until they dry out and can
stand again ... and then they walk out. The paramedic said
the ambulance won't be used as a taxi to detox; but they'll
take someone to hospital. Fair enough.
Once again, The Lord's Rain finds itself in the right place
at the right time. I can't count the number of people who've
needed medical attention -- in various forms -- at times we've
been open, and have come into our place to find the shelter
and someone to make the call.
Drew Snider's Blog on the vision God gave him.
THE SHOWER SAGA – 1 Tuesday Dec. 11, 2007
One of your agent's ministry activities involves Vancouver's
Downtown East Side. Skid Row. Identified by some expert from
the United Nations as the WORST location for poverty in the
urbanized world, which is pretty scary, considering the competition:
New York, East LA, Kolkata. Maybe it's a bit of hyperbole
from someone wanting to contrast the phenomenal wealth which
parks its collective bottom just a couple of blocks away in
the luxury suites at General Motors Place or is visible from
the DTES on the North Shore mountains. Maybe he's trying to
wake up the powers that be, as we get ready to preen on the
world stage with the 2010 Winter Olympics (am I allowed to
use that name without copyright infringement?). Or maybe he's
absolutely right.
Whatever, it ain't pretty, and Gospel Mission (not Union Gospel),
which is the oldest mission in Canada (since the 20s), is
right bang in the worst postal code in the country. The alley
next to our building generally reeks of ... well, it reeks
... people smoke up and shoot up outside the Mission, either
in a doorway or in Pigeon Park, a longtime gathering place
for the poor and destitute.
These people are victims of a lot of things, including theories.
A popular theory among civic officials is that if you give
drug addicts a safe, healthy environment in which to do their
drugs, that will somehow reduce the harm and therefore solve
the problem. I'm not a stupid person, but I'm having a hard
time getting my head around the theory, especially as I pick
my way around the bald, obvious evidence that IT'S NOT WORKING.
When the federal government wanted to take a second sober
look at the concept before approving any more funding, the
screeching from the program's proponents (including those
who were being paid to run it) was deafening. "The site
is working!" they protested, while not exactly stating
how they arrived at that conclusion, leaving me feeling a
little like John Cleese, when Michael Palin has just told
him his cheese shop is the finest in the district: "Explain
the reasoning behind that statement!" The closest I've
seen to a benchmark for measuring "success" has
been the claim that no one had yet died from an overdose at
the safe injection site.
Sorry ... my benchmark for any kind of drug program is the
number of people who have kicked the habit, and the number
of people who no longer shoot up in back alleys or smoke their
crack in open view ... not because they've been given a safe,
out-of-sight/out-of-mind place to do it, but because THEY'RE
NO LONGER ON DRUGS!
So what does this have to do with showers? Surprisingly,
a lot. People who come to our "upper room" at 331
Carrall Street have a tendency to be quite dirty. Filthy,
in fact. Many try to stay clean by going to our laundry area
at the back and washing up at the laundry tub before our services.
They live in shelters, long-term, single room hotels or on
the streets. Where do they wash up, otherwise?
In late September, I took a trip to New York City. I have
a friend there I hadn't seen in almost 30 years, but beyond
that reunion, I didn't have much planned. But I had a notion
to go and check out the ministries serving the poor and destitute
there and see how they did it. That notion got kicked into
high gear when I went to a series of meetings at my home church,
Westpointe Christian Centre, with Lee Grady, publisher of
Charisma magazine.
Lee is a prophet, and invited those in Ministry to come up
for a word from the Lord. The word he spoke over me was that
God would be sending me on a journey (he had no way of knowing
I was about to leave for NYC) and that I would be acquiring
a lot of new ideas about ministering to people. He used the
image of "axe heads", like the one that Elisha caused
to float to the surface in I Kings. Lee prophesied that God
would provide me with more and sharper axe heads, which would
finally cut through, rather than bounce off.
Among the places I visited in NYC was the Bowery Mission,
the second-oldest rescue mission in NYC and third oldest in
the US (there's one in Chicago that's in-between the two in
NY). Pastor Reggie Stutzmann -- a Pentecostal -- gave me over
an hour of his time to show me around the place and share
some of the things they do. One of those services is a shower
program. Twice a week for men -- and once a week for women
-- they open up for people to come in and get a shower and
a change of clothes.
Suddenly, I had an "axe head". I brought back others
to Vancouver, but this was one worth considering. The problem
was, where was the handle?
Gospel Mission occupies the second floor of a two-storey walkup.
Its space is very well used, with a commercial kitchen, chapel
area, baptismal tank, office, prayer room ... but noplace
to put showers. So I let the idea lie fallow for a while,
waiting for God to provide the handle.
He did, early in November, when our senior pastor, Barry Babcook,
mentioned off-handedly that one of the two ground-floor tenants
-- an anti-everything coalition I had dubbed the "rebels
without a clue" -- had moved out.
I told Barry about the shower idea, and he told me he'd had
the same thing on his heart for years, but it was a matter
of space. He called the landlord and the landlord agreed to
give us two weeks to come up with a plan -- and money to go
with it. I started sending out letters soliciting funds --
which has not been my forte -- and doing a lot of praying.
I've had some good personal success with praying things into
existence, and when God has His hand on something, there shouldn't
be any doubt that it will happen. Looking at the timing of
everything and the landlord's willingness to give us the chance,
it was obvious God's hand was on this project, and we just
needed to push from our end.
Three days before the self-imposed deadline, Barry called
to give some encouragement -- mainly pointing out that when
God wants something done, He'll generally wait until the 11th
hour, 59th minute.
Two days before the self-imposed deadline, one church -- ironically,
one on Vancouver Island where I fellowshipped in the year
or so leading up to my going into Ministry -- came through
with a large one-time donation and a pledge of monthly contributions,
and a gentleman of "some means" who attends my church
in Vancouver -- Westpointe Christian Centre -- called to say
we could count him in for an even larger up-front donation,
with more to come later.
As usual, God pulls off the "grandstand play" with
the game on the line!
So as of this writing, we are getting our heads into the fact
that this project is a go. More donations are coming in, along
with pledges of monthly contributions -- which will be the
next big challenge: making sure the operating expenses --
rent, heat, water, etc. -- are covered.
The prophecy Lee Grady spoke isn't the only one involved here,
you know: the pastor at that church on Vancouver Island spoke
one over Barry a few years back, that Gospel Mission would
expand. This shower project gives us a street-level presence
that we haven't had since we moved into the Upper Room in
the 1940s. There's enough room in that space to do other outreach
activities.
For the Lord of Hosts hath purposed, and who shall disannul
it? And His hand is stretched out, and who shall turn it back?
(Isa. 14:27)
I'll keep you updated.
Want to contribute? You can send a one-time donation, or pledge
a monthly amount ($50, say), to Gospel Mission, PO Box 57151,
Vancouver BC V5K 1Z1 Canada. Write "Showers" in
the memo line on the check.
The Shower Saga – 2 Sat. Dec, 15
Updating you on the Shower Saga (see below) ... today, I
hand over the checks to the landlord. By day's end, we will
have possession of the space.
Praise the Lord God who provides -- including providing the
monthly operating costs (if you'd like to donate, the information
is at the bottom of "The Shower Saga - 1").
The Shower Saga – 3 Sun. Dec. 16
I did indeed pick up the keys to the ground-floor space below
Carrall Street Church (331 Carrall St., Vancouver) yesterday
(Saturday the 15th). The whole Story So Far is summed up in
"The Shower Saga-1", below, but it's amazing to
look at how this went from a "neat idea" to its
current point. God has definitely been leading the way and
propping us up where needed, and this morning, a piece of
Scripture leapt out at me. And when it was evening, His disciples
came to Him, saying, This is a desert place, and the time
is now past; send the multitude away, that they may go into
the villages, and by themselves victuals.
But Jesus said unto them, They need not depart; give ye them
to eat.
And they say unti Him, We have here but five loaves and two
fishes.
He said, Bring them hither to me.
-- Matt. 14:15-18
When God tells you to do something, He doesn't tell you to
afford it. How many times have we heard a directive from God
to do something, but we've shelved it because we didn't have
the resources? Yet, that passage in Matthew tells us that,
when Jesus gives us an assignment, we are to take what we
do have and hand it over to Him. After all, what came next?
Those five loaves and two fishes were converted into a meal
for 5,000 men, plus women and children, with twelve baskets
full of leftovers.
In fact, the very next thing that happened was that Jesus
"gave thanks", and then started handing out the
food.
Thanks for what? Not thanks for feeding everybody, because
a specific prayer like that, I believe, ties God's hands to
what we think we need; but thanks that God is in control and
that, so long as we're obedient and walk in His ways, He will
provide all our needs according to His riches in glory. And
"thanks" before we see the manifestation, because
in God's plan, it's already a done deal: we just have to put
it in motivation with our faith.
So that's what we've been doing in getting the shower project
off the ground. We took the resources we do have and gave
them to Jesus; giving thanks that, if God has put this project
on our hearts and given us the assignment to carry it out
(Jesus, saying "Give ye them to eat"), then He will
provide what we need.
One thing to remember here is that, when we take the resources
we have and give them to Jesus, those are only the resources
that we know about. Sometimes, we forget that in going to
Jesus, we're exercising one of the most valuable resources
we have: the Lord Himself.
So this is to encourage you that, when you hear from the
Lord, or sense that He's put something on your heart to do,
don't just blow it off as a "nice idea, but ...":
press closer to Him and hand Him the resources you have ...
give thanks ... and get ready to start serving the fish!
The Shower Saga – 4 Fri. Dec. 21
(Funny ... I thought we were up to more than four ...)
ENORMOUS news earlier this week! Andrew Sheret, Ltd., which
has been in business, providing bathrooms to British Columbians,
since 1892, is donating the showers we need! Barry and I had
been discussing our next moves, and the next pressing need
is the showers themselves. So the Lord gave me a nudge, and
said, "Andrew Sheret".
Of course!
Back in 1992, when I was at CFAX Victoria, I was called on
to MC Andrew Sheret's 100th anniversary dinner (http://www.sheret.com).
The company struck me as one class act (partly because they
paid me for the gig -- something virtually unheard of in Victoria!),
and really, you can't stay in business 115 years if you don't
have some kind of integrity. I hadn't had any dealings with
them since then, but I called their head office in Victoria,
wound up talking to the president, Brian Findlay. He remembered
me; I emailed him the proposal; he said "yes" without
hesitation!
Another brother has stepped up to the plate to provide all
the soap and shampoo, and donations of towels are coming in
for Kathleen's "Towel Mania" -- she's in charge
of organizing that, and she and her son will be pushing that
forward, when school goes back in in January.
And we still have to get pledges to cover the operating costs.
30 people pledging $50 a month will do the job, and it's all
tax-deductible. They can be sent to Gospel Mission, PO Box
57151, Vancouver, BC V5K 1Z1.
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